The Caucasian Chalk Circle: Religion

THE CAUCASIAN CHALK CIRCLE

In this play, the storyline and most of the context are directly related to Catholicism. Brecht uses biblical references as a in a negative tone rather than a positive. We can tell that he is not in favor of Christianity or religion as a whole. As we have learned before, Brecht was highly influenced by Karl Marx or Marxism. Also, communism uses the ideologies of Marxism as well where religion is not accepted. Since Brecht is influenced by it, he probably agrees that a society is better off without any religion.

From the beginning of the play, we notice the straightforward religious context. The story begins on an Easter Sunday, which was time when Christ was resurrected. As we move forward in the story,  the government was killed by his brother, the Fat Prince. Brecht relates this to the biblical story of Cain and Able.The Seven Sacraments of the Catholic Church are also evident throughout the play. We see the evidence for this in the beginning when Simon and Grusha are engage.

In Act 2, the second sacrament that was evident in this play, which was Baptism. We understand this after the quote "I'll wash you, son, and christen you in glacier water." The religious context in act 2 was about Jussup. He was married to Grusha. He represented Joseph who was the father of Jesus. He was signified as Joseph since he married Mary when she was pregnant.

The last religious connection made in this act was when Aniko kicked Grusha out of her home. She is described as religious and she used that as in excuse to kick her out. After this act we can clearly see that Brecht uses religion as a negative theme in the story.

In act 4, we see the religious context when Azdak was compared to Christ. We see this when the Singer says, "Broken law like bread he gave them." Lastly, in act 5 we can see that Azdak copies Christ during his last act. He lay on the ground after he was beaten and pretended to be dead. After the messenger had arrived he was “resurrected” following which he wears his gown again.

During the end of this story, we see the huge similarity to the tale of Solomon from the Bible. In this story Salomon had to choose the real baby of the mother. It was basically a test where the baby would be cut in half and each part would be given to one another, the real mother would give the child to the other woman. This is similar because Grusha and Natella had to fight for the Michael when he was put in the center but Grusha did not take the baby. This is how it was decided that Grusha was the real mother.

After reading the play, we can see the many different religious contexts in the play. Brecht blames societies problems and the way people act because of religion and he portrays it through the acts of some character that are religions. The biggest example was how Aniko had kicked out Grusha from her house and she was introduced as someone who is religious. Brecht makes a mockery of religion and uses major characters from the Bible to portray the negative characters in his play.The negative theme about religion is evident in some of Brecht’s other plays as well. As I have mentioned before, Brecht’s influence of the Marxism could have been the trigger which made him detest religion.

"The Caucasian Chalk Circle." Gradesaver. N.p., n.d. Web. <http://www.gradesaver.com/the-caucasian-chalk-circle/>.

Brecht, Bertold. "The Caucasian Chalk Circle." Socialist Stories. N.p., n.d. Web. 6 Mar. 2014. <http://socialiststories.net/liberate/The%20Caucasian%20Chalk%20Circle%20-%20Bertolt%20Brecht.pdf>.